From the category archives:

History

Rob Neyer occasionally posts “book club” entries as part of his Just a  Bit Outside site. This one was put up shortly after the passing of Alison Gordon, a sportswriter who covered the Toronto Blue Jays and chronicled the experience in her book Foul Ball!: Five Years in the American League. This piece from BaseballEssential […]

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NOTE: I have been posting these things long enough now that a few have commented that the introductory section isn’t necessary anymore. But I’m leaving it in because, to paraphrase Joe DiMaggio when asked why he played so hard all the time, there may be people who’ve never read the best-seller entries before. So on […]

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NOTE: I have been posting these things long enough now that a few have commented that the introductory section isn’t necessary anymore. But I’m leaving it in because, to paraphrase Joe DiMaggio when asked why he played so hard all the time, there may be people who’ve never read the best-seller entries before. So on […]

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Submitted for your interest, this feature by Jacob Kamaras at JNS.org on John Klima’slatest baseball book, The Game Must Go On: Hank Greenberg, Pete Gray, and the Great Days of Baseball on the Home Front in WWII. * * * Baseball fans might most vividly remember Hank Greenberg for his chase of Babe Ruth’s single-season […]

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NOTE: I have been posting these things long enough now that a few have commented that the introductory section isn’t necessary anymore. But I’m leaving it in because, to paraphrase Joe DiMaggio when asked why he played so hard all the time, there may be people who’ve never read the best-seller entries before. So on […]

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Since I posted the first of these on a Thursday, which is known on social media as a time of reflection, I thought to make it a regular thing under this rubric. These are kind of fun; it’s like a box of chocolates — you never know what you’re gonna get. (Actually, I never understood […]

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NOTE: I have been posting these things long enough now that a few have commented that the introductory section isn’t necessary anymore. But I’m leaving it in because, to paraphrase Joe DiMaggio when asked why he played so hard all the time, there may be people who’ve never read the best-seller entries before. So on […]

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Another in a series of feeble attempts to catch up on older items. You will forgive the possible occasional duplication from previous entries. First off, well, this is kind of insulting to baseball and books. * Ed Lucas received a lot of attention for his recent memoir, and rightly so. I had a great conversation […]

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I tuned into the Yankee game on Friday just as Alex Rodriguez was coming to bat, looking for his 3,000th hit. Timing is everything: ARod launched a home run for the milestone. It was the third time a player hit a home run for the magic number, including former teammate Derek Jeter. The difference is […]

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NOTE: I have been posting these things long enough now that a few have commented that the introductory section isn’t necessary anymore. But I’m leaving it in because, to paraphrase Joe DiMaggio when asked why he played so hard all the time, there may be people who’ve never read the best-seller entries before. So on […]

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{ Comments on this entry are closed }

Since I posted the first of these on a Thursday, which is known on social media as a time of reflection, I thought to make it a regular thing under this rubric. These are kind of fun; it’s like a box of chocolates — you never know what you’re gonna get. (Actually, I never understood […]

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Strangers in the Bronx: DiMaggio, Mantle, and the Changing of the Yankee Guard by Andrew O’Toole. Triumph 304 Pages, $25.95 There has been a lot written about the “changing of the guard” when it came to the Commerce Comet replacing the Yankee Clipper, but nothing that approaches the overall depth of this bittersweet tale by […]

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The Baseball Hall of Fame will host 11 Authors Series events throughout the season, bringing noted baseball authors to Cooperstown for special lectures and book signings. Among the highlights of the 2015 Authors Series is an appearance by former major league pitcher Masanori Murakami, the first Japanese-born player in the history of major league baseball. […]

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I love collecting first editions of magazines, so it was a nice surprise when I received this on Saturday, totally out of the blue  Very snazzy. The new offering from the  Helmar Brewing Company considers what publisher Charles Mandel calls “modern vintage” cards, although there’s lots of non-collectible features, too. Mike Shannon, editor-in-chief of the […]

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Books have been written about the use of baseball as an imperialist tool by the United States. We send people to foreign countries; they bring baseball with them, and pretty soon the residents of those foreign have embraced the game to a degree even more enthusiastic than back in the good ole U.S.A. Case in […]

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NOTE: I have been posting these things long enough now that a few have commented that the introductory section isn’t necessary anymore. But I’m leaving it in because, to paraphrase Joe DiMaggio when asked why he played so hard all the time, there may be people who’ve never read the best-seller entries before. So on […]

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Since I posted the first of these on a Thursday, which is known on social media as a time of reflection, I thought to make it a regular thing under this rubric. These are kind of fun; it’s like a box of chocolates — you never know what you’re gonna get. (Actually, I never understood […]

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According to a story on the Sports Business Daily website, “Recently retired MLB Commissioner Bud Selig has hired Sandy Montag of IMG as his agent to represent him in selling the rights to a book about his life and baseball. Montag will also represent Selig for speaking engagements, consulting and other matters.” I was under […]

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Who doesn’t like pretty things? Museums, such as the Baseball Hall of Fame, are filled with them. But not everyone can get up to Cooperstown. For them, there are books like A History of Baseball in 100 Objects, by Josh Leventhal. Leventhal — whose previous books on baseball include The World Series: An Illustrated Encyclopedia […]

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NOTE: I have been posting these things long enough now that a few have commented that the introductory section isn’t necessary anymore. But I’m leaving it in because, to paraphrase Joe DiMaggio when asked why he played so hard all the time, there may be people who’ve never read the best-seller entries before. So on […]

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